Few changes anticipated as budget nears completion

By DAVID HULSE

MONTICELLO, NY — Sullivan County Manager Dan Briggs says he anticipates that consultants will recommend few changes in his tentative 2005 budget.

On October 1, Briggs released a $179,943,574 spending plan for the county, which included a three-percent spending increase over the current year.

The tentative budget called for a nine percent increase in the county property tax levy, but some changes have been made during the legislative review, including the restoration of $1.5 million in road repair funding for the Division of Public Works. Briggs now estimates that the tax levy increase will fall “somewhere between nine and 10 percent.”

Later in October, the legislature approved a contract with BKSD, a division of the auditing firm of O’Connor, Davies, Munns, Dobbins, LLP, to conduct an outside review of the budget.

Briggs said the consultants were completing their review last week. “I don’t see any major changes coming. They may feel we need to be a bit more aggressive in our anticipated sales tax revenues.”

Briggs had estimated $26 million in sales tax revenues. This year’s estimated $25.2 million was exceeded in the fall before the preparation of his budget.

Drawing $11.7 million of past-unallocated surplus reduced the tentative levy to $35,079,595 and mitigated the amount of new property taxes necessary.

New growth, almost universal in town tax bases around Sullivan County, will also blunt individual tax increases. He said while the growth is a positive, it doesn’t influence spending decisions. “It’s a safety net,” Briggs said.

Briggs said that the legislature will review the consultant’s recommendations, and party caucuses will make final revision recommendations to the budget before its presentation.

In addition to lost landfill revenues, rising costs of Medicaid, health care, insurance and petroleum all contributed to the tax increase.

Briggs said Medicaid costs continue to increase and amount to 51.3 percent of this year’s tax levy. In total appropriations, Sullivan’s family and mental hygiene services portion of the budget amounts to 36.34 percent, which is more than twice its spending in any other area.

Health insurance costs rose 27.93 percent from the current budget to $14.7 million, while pension contributions, still impacted by the state pension fund’s investment losses, rose 92.4 percent to $5.4 million.

Hearings on the proposed 2005 county budget have been scheduled for December 2 at 1:50 p.m. and on December 7 at 6:00 p.m., both sessions to be in the hearing room at the government center.